Joel opened his mouth. The major-domo put his finger to his lips with a silencing gesture, covered the action with a yawn. But his eyes held a warning.
He slid his hand beneath his desk. Something clicked. The tattoo quit fluorescing.
"Put this on," he said going to a clothes locker and tossing Joel one of the white slave tunics. "Miss Cameron left orders that you weren't to be assigned until she sent for you."
Joel dropped the tunic over his head with a confused feeling.
"This way." The fat man led him into a corridor. As the door shut on the office, he stopped so abruptly that Joel bumped into him.
"All right," he said, "it's safe to talk here. But watch the mirrors. They're televisors! There isn't a room in the palace that isn't equipped with them. We're under constant surveillance."
Joel's brain was reeling. So the palace serfs were organized too!
"Listen close," the major-domo went on low-voiced. "Meeting tonight. You'll be instructed in your part for the day."
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when the door at the opposite end of the corridor slid aside. The fat man jumped a foot, his face taking on the color of wet clay.
A girl brushed into the passage, stopped with a startled expression. She was young, Joel saw, and pretty with straight brown hair. Her short white tunic exposed long symmetrical legs.